


Planetaria

by kuragin



Category: Supernatural
Genre: & probably won't be a main focus, (sort of), Dream Sharing, M/M, Post-Episode: s05e19 Hammer of the Gods, Pretend I wrote this while season 5 was still airing, fair warning destiel won't come in until later
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-02
Updated: 2020-12-02
Packaged: 2021-03-10 09:00:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,482
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27848130
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kuragin/pseuds/kuragin
Summary: When Sam woke up, he was on the Moon.
Relationships: Castiel/Dean Winchester, Gabriel/Sam Winchester
Comments: 2
Kudos: 9





	Planetaria

**Author's Note:**

> is this my best work? no. did i write it in my notes app at 3 am? yes. did i edit it? no. am i gonna post it anyway? hell fucking yes babey. not finished yet but don't worry i DO know where i'm going with it and i DO intend to actually finish this one, i prommy (different way of saying promise)

When Sam woke up, he was on the Moon.

It took him a second or two to catch up—mess of stars above him, rocks jutting into his back, palms flat on a thick layer of white dust—but he got there, eventually. Moon it is, he thought, or else something very similar.

He sat up. _Breathe in. Breathe out._ No problems there. No spacesuit, either—a dream? Sam didn’t know. Even if this _were_ real, it wouldn’t have been the weirdest thing that had ever happened to him. Or the most normal, to be fair.

Either way, he thought, he’d better be on his guard. Better safe than sorry.

He stood, slowly, achingly; felt his joints protest enough to make him wonder how long he’d been lying there. He looked down at the moon dust coating his palms, rolling it between his thumbs and his fingers in quiet fascination. Like chalk, he thought. He remembered he'd gone rock climbing, once, with Jess. He hadn't thought about that in years.

The Moon. The stars. Sam tilted his head as far back as it would go, letting the ground disappear from his line of sight.

On his seventh birthday, when hunting was still just something his classmates' parents did on weekends, Dean had snuck him out the bathroom window of a Motel 6 to take him to a free museum. He had sat in the planetarium, rapt, as a bored college student listed off the constellations projected above him, letting himself believe for a moment that the stories behind them were real; that there was something more to the world. On the way home, he had told Dean he wanted to be an astronaut. He hadn’t, really; he had just wanted an excuse to keep looking up. Maybe, if he really tried, if he was _enough_ , the gods would pin him to the sky, too.

Not that any of that mattered now. No constellations here, anyway—at least, not any that he knew.

“Marble’s that way, Sammy.”

Sam closed his eyes, exhaled. A dream, then.

“Gabriel.”

“The one and only.”

Sam didn’t move. He felt buoyant, weightless—even his hair lay a little lighter on his head. It was nice, he thought. His subconscious was nice, sometimes.

“What’s the matter? Didn’t miss me?” Sam could hear something, but he didn't... _Hm_. Annoyance, maybe. Hesitation.

Sam let the corner of his mouth quirk up, just a little. “What do you want me to say, no?”

“Suit yourself,” said Gabriel, shrug evident in his voice. “Depends on how you usually treat people that die for you, I guess.”

Sam let his head loll forward, blinking against the brightness of the Moon’s surface. He turned, finally, to look at the man behind him.

And, _oh_ —Gabriel looked good. Really, really good. It wasn’t just him, either—something about the setting, Sam thought, or the way the angle made it seem like the Earth was rising where his neck met his shoulder, was connecting dots in Sam’s mind that had never quite made it when Gabriel was alive. If they had seen him like this, Sam thought, they never would have thought a stake would kill him. Sam felt a pang of loss at the sight; for the world, for himself.

Gabriel smirked. “You’re covered in dirt.”

Sam huffed out a laugh, fighting the sudden urge to look at his shoes. It was a lot: Moon, stars, dead archangel. “It’s moon dust, Gabriel.”

“Is there really a difference?”

“You’re telling me there isn’t?”

"Whatever it is, it is _all_ over you,” Gabriel said. “But, hey, who cares, am I right? You seen this view?”

Sam glanced at the Earth, then back at Gabriel. He was wearing the clothes he’d died in, Sam realized with a jolt. He tried to focus on changing that, or at least on fixing the hole in the front of his shirt, but his subconscious stood firm. He’d never been good at lucid dreaming, anyway.

“Anyone ever tell you it’s not very nice to stare?”

Sam shook his head; met Gabriel’s eyes. “Why do you care? It’s my dream, anyway.”

Gabriel raised an eyebrow. “Dream? You wound me, kiddo.”

Sam looked at him, unimpressed. “You’re dead, Gabriel. I saw you.”

“And, what? You don’t see me now?”

Sam paused. “I do,” he said. He watched as Gabriel frowned a little, tilting his head just enough to align the Earth behind him like a halo. It made Sam feel studied, flayed. “I do see you.”

And he let himself imagine, just for a second, what it would be like to hope; what it would mean if Gabriel were telling the truth. They hadn’t been friends, exactly, before Gabriel’s death, but Sam would be lying if he said he hadn’t spent more than a few sleepless nights wrestling with the idea that _the archangel Gabriel_ had died, in a way, for _him_. It didn’t mean much to Dean, he could tell, but Sam had spent enough of his life praying to wonder if that was what an answer looked like.

Gabriel, for his part, looked a little—lost? Concerned? Sam wasn’t sure. “Look, Sammy, I–“ he blinked; came back a little clearer, “I just brought you here to let you know I was doing alright. Didn’t want you boys getting your panties in a twist over me."

"We weren't."

"Your brother wasn't. You—" Gabriel flicked his wrist in a circle, stopping it to point between Sam's eyes, "—pray too loud."

Sam didn't have anything to say to that. He felt himself flush, blood pressing up against the skin of his face as if trying to escape, helped along by the Moon's weak gravity.

So, he cleared his throat. Changed the subject.

"Why here? I mean, why the Moon, of all places?"

"Dad's afterthought. 'Stick a rock in the sky so the kids don't trip over themselves at night—but oh, no, nothing too bright! They still need to work for it,'" Gabriel rolled his eyes. "It's the last place anyone in my family would look. Only downside is," he snapped his fingers, "mojo-free zone."

Sam furrowed his brow, confused. "But you're an—"

"Yep," Gabriel said, popping the 'p.' "But, no—Dad wanted us focusing on all that," he gestured at the Earth. "On you guys. Fixing your problems. Listening to you complain, day in, day out. Heaven forbid any of us ever run off to magic up our own fun," he said, a little rueful.

Gabriel continued, "It's like a bad signal. If I concentrate, I can keep you here, but anything bigger maxes out the ol' processor. I figure I have just enough juice to launch myself home when all this ends, assuming I can get enough momentum going."

Sam raised his eyebrows. "Home?"

Gabriel winced. "Yeah, well," he said, quiet. "Guess we'll see how it all shakes out."

"Guess we will."

They looked at each other. Sam opened his mouth, closed it again. Took a deep breath in.

"Why me, though?"

Gabriel looked at him, annoyed. "I told you, you pray—"

"I pray loud, I know. I know," Sam tripped over the words; felt, in a way, caught, as the color returned to his cheeks. "But why does that matter? You never cared before. If you are alive—if this isn't a dream—I'm sure Cas would want to know."

"Castiel is a big boy, Sammy."

"He's your _brother_ , Gabriel."

"He can handle himself."

"And, what, I can't?" Sam let out a frustrated sound that was almost a laugh.

Gabriel breathed out, a little sharp. "Look, kiddo. Someone down there is gonna have to avenge me, and you three are the only ones interested in taking the job. I can't have you losing sleep over me." He stepped forward, tugging on the hem of Sam's shirt to straighten it. Sam felt it like a punch.

"Be a good soldier," Gabriel continued, brushing the dust off of Sam's shoulders. " _Play your part_ , whatever that still means. It's getting boring as shit up here, and I'm gonna want something to come back to when this is all over. Can you do that for me?"

Against his will, Sam stopped breathing; he covered it with a small cough. "Okay. Okay."

Gabriel smiled, wide and full. "That's what I like to hear." He turned to squint at the Earth. "And perfect timing, too. Gotta get you back into your body before Dean wakes up and thinks you bit it in your sleep." He turned back and pressed his palm flat where Sam's ribs met, ignoring his protests and aborted questions. "Sorry, no time. This stays between us, you hear me? Not a lot of places left to hide from my family around here."

Sam nodded, bewildered. "O-okay, yeah, but I don't see how—"

"See you on the other side." Gabriel winked, then _pushed_ , hard, into Sam's chest.

**Author's Note:**

> whew that was deranged anyway i'm on tumblr @ bugs2005 (spn) and @ greatcomets (main) come hang !!!


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